CPI-E
Understanding the 2026 Social Security COLA: What Seniors Need to Know
After weeks of anticipation and a two-week delay, the Social Security Administration has announced the cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) for 2026. Beginning in January, recipients will see a 2.8 percent increase in their monthly benefit payments. This yearly adjustment is meant…
Senate Bill S.4877 Would Buy 19 Years
Titled the “Protecting and Preserving Social Security Act,” S.4877 recently introduced by U.S. Senator Mazie K. Hirono (D-HI), would extend the full depletion of Social Security’s trust funds an additional 19 years, to 2054. The length of the extension was…
Social Security’s 2025 COLA, and a “World of Distress”
The 2.5% cost-of-living adjustment is a welcomed boost for Social Security beneficiaries; that’s a given. And the fact that this adjustment reflects a lessening of the inflationary pressures that have weighed on the economy for the past four years is…
COLA Announced – Reactions Now Taking Center Stage
Yesterday’s official announcement of a 2.5% Social Security cost-of-living adjustment arrived as expected, along with the also-expected commentary on the inadequacy of the benefit increase. Calling the 2.5% bump a “lost opportunity,” The Senior Citizens League (TSCL) executive director Shannon…
Another Push for CPI-E
The potential for use of a measurement more reflective of senior spending patterns has been under investigation for some time, and is the subject of pending legislation to adopt this senior-friendly tool. A recent post on planadvisor.com by Paul Mulholland…
CPI-E Advanced in New Congressional Bill
U.S. Rep. Ruben Gallego (D-AZ) recently introduced legislation that could increase the monthly benefits paid to seniors by requiring the Social Security Administration to use a different inflation-calculation formula. His bill, titled the “Boosting Benefits and COLAs for Seniors Act,” calls…
Changing how COLA is calculated
U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand has introduced the bill “Under the Boosting Benefits and COLAs for Seniors Act (S. 3974), which would change the calculation of the yearly Social Security cost-of-living-adjustment (COLA) by switching from the Consumer Price Index Urban Wage…
New bill endorses CPI-E as a means to avoid steady loss of seniors’ purchasing power
At last week’s Aging Committee hearing on preserving and protecting Social Security, Sen. Bob Casey (D-PA) summarized the newly-introduced Boosting Benefits and COLAs for Seniors Act as intending to “help seniors contend with rising costs by changing the way that Social…
Senior Citizens League pushes for More Effective COLA Process
It hasn’t really changed since cost-of-living adjustments (COLA) became a reality nearly 50 years ago, and the projected 2024 announcement was again based on use of the Consumer Price Index for Urban Wage Earners and Clerical Workers (CPI-W), a statistic that…
CPI-E vs. CPI-W? A Look at What the Diffrerence would be.
The issue of how best to calculate the annual cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) for Social Security beneficiaries has surfaced as part of the discussion on reforming this massive senior benefit program, and some have advocated for an approach that better fits…